Liquor store robber triggered a gun battle. But mother and daughter working were ready, video shows

If his mugshot is any indication, this suspected robber was no match for the mother-daughter pair he tried to take on last week, according to police.

Ashley Lee, 30, was working at her family’s liquor store in Tulsa, Okla., last Thursday when a man with a sawed-off shotgun walked into the store and pointed his weapon at her, surveillance video shows. Lee’s mother — Tina Ring, 53 — was also working that night at the store, Forest Acres Liquor, the Tulsa World reports.

“I didn’t want him to hurt my daughter,” Ring told the the newspaper. “That was my main thought.”

The masked robber demanded money of the two women, which they gave him from the store’s cash register, video shows.

Be the first to know.

No one covers what is happening in our community better than we do. And with a digital subscription, you'll never miss a local story.

“All I was thinking was ‘Just give him the money and go,’ ” Ring told the World.

But as the robber headed for the door, the women activated the store’s security system — attempting to trap him between two sets of doors.

Tyrone Lee, 36

Tulsa County Jail

It didn’t work as planned, though: The inside door wouldn’t close quickly enough, but the outside door locked — preventing the robber from getting out, but still allowing him to make it back in the store. And once he got back in, he trained his gun on the women, who had been hiding.

That’s when the women pulled out their guns, video shows. Even after the women shot at him, though, the robber didn’t leave because the outside door had locked.

“They shot him multiple times and he kept coming,” Tulsa Police Sgt. Brandon Watkins told KFOR. “He took the gun away and he pistol-whipped the woman.”

“I didn’t want to shoot her, and I didn’t want to shoot him — but how can he hurt my mom?” Lee asked KFOR. “So, I mean in her defense, I did what I had to.”

Tyrone Lee, the 36-year-old suspect, went to a nearby hospital in critical condition, having sustained multiple gunshot wounds, police said. Lee drove himself there, according to an affidavit reviewed by the World. (He is unrelated to the victim, Ashley Lee.)

Once at the hospital, Lee was put into a medically-induced coma, police told KFOR.

We're out at the scene of an attempted armed robbery at 1275 S. Memorial. A black male came into the store with a shotgun. An employee at the store fired shots at the Armed Robbery and he then fled the scene... pic.twitter.com/8MV0DF6un3

Lee was booked Thursday at the Tulsa County Jail on multiple charges of robbery with a firearm, according to jail records. He’s also been charged with operating a motor vehicle without a license.

He’s now being held on $1 million bond, according to jail records. Authorities said they have tied him to a string of 10 robberies beginning in January.

Lee is scheduled to appear in court on March 8, jail records said.

Lee’s family has spoken to local media about the shock of seeing their relative in a shootout video that went viral online.

“When I looked at it, it was like, ‘Oh my God, he was out of his mind,’ ” said Corean Lee, the suspect’s aunt, in an interview with KTUL. “I don’t know what he was on, but he was out of his mind. That was not my nephew that I saw there.”

The aunt added that she had raised the suspect since he was just 5, and that he suffers from schizophrenia and seizures.

She also said she went to the liquor store to apologize to his victims, KTUL reports.

“I don’t understand it. What happened to him, what caused this to happen, and I still don’t,” she told the TV station.